Live Tour

NewJane Interviews xxpiratexx, Top PSO Finisher at Harrah's Rincon

NewJane: You have repeated success in tourney play both live and online. What ONE piece of advice would you give a NEW player if they came to you and said, "I want to try my hand at a brick and mortar event, and the only experience I have is freerolls online"

xxPiratexx: Pay attention to your surroundings, Your stack size, everyone else's stack size. You don't have the amount in the pot listed for you, you don't have accurate stack totals for your opponents, you don't have "raise pot" button attached to the dealer. These are just basics that you will have to learn to track when you start playing live. Relax and just play your game. It moves a lot slower at a B&M then on-line, don't get bored.

NewJane: Do you have any advice or guidelines you would share with a new player who is trying to build a bankroll for live tourney play?

xxPiratexx: Play ring games for $$$ and tournaments on the side. You look at all of those pros out there and there are very few who only play tournaments. Learn to play cash games. They do differ from tournaments.

NewJane: Do you play ring games? And if so, what limits and where?

xxPiratexx: I play $30-60 Limit HE on-line mostly, I've snuck into the $50-100 a couple of times. I'll step down to 15-30, 20-40 if I'm running bad.

I don't get out much with the 3 young ones I have. But when I can get to the Commerce, I play $40-80 and I haven't play the NL games there yet, but I will. When I get out to Pechanga, I've played in the $300 NL and $500 min/no max. Both good games and they have a 20-40 kill game (Limit) that I like.

NewJane: What is one glaring mistake you see players make in live tourney play?

xxPiratexx: Panic, moving in when they don't need to yet. One of the funny things about live play is that you have chips, and you look at your stack and you look at someone elses and you think you need to have one like theirs. You DON'T. Just know where you're at in the tourney, you can see how many tables are left and how many chips you started with. Try to figure out the approx. average stack. Know your M (ratio of your stack size to the cost of a round). Tourneys take a long, long time, especially live. I like to figure out the number of chips in play. Say you start with 2000 and there's 500 people. So there's 1 million in play, that means the avg stack is going to be 100K at the final table and so will be 10K with 10 tables left. Just use those as guidelines if you want to measure up. M is the most important number though and dictates your play. Try not to do anything stupid.

NewJane: Give us an example of something that simply drives you nuts when you are in the heat of battle in a tourney?

xxPiratexx: Drama Queens. Some people think the cameras are always on. Speed it up when you don't have anything. I know sometimes you have to think, but some people seem to have a major decision every hand. It's very annoying. For those of you who are under the impression that stalling helps you, forget it. You need to see as many hands as possible.

NewJane: And the question we are all dying to hear the answer to: What is it like being Joybell's son-in-law?

XxPiratexx: You've all seen "Cuckoo's Nest"? lol

Nah, she'd do anything in the world for me, as long as she could get someone else to do it for her. And that someone is usually me.

But seriously, she has nothing but complimentary things to say, but once she turns away from the mirror... look out!!!

OK, I'll stop there. As you've gathered, she does have a great sense of humor and you should probably ask her how she puts up with me. We get along just great. She introduced me to PSO didn't she?

Thanks for the variety pack of questions it was fun.

NewJane: Thanks, Jerry! I sure enjoyed it!!

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